Columbia
The Union of Federal Republics - or New Colombia - is a federation of cities in Montana and Canada that emerged at the end of the 23rd century as a quickly growing, capitalistic nation. History Founding and Matthew's Era In the winter of early 2293, the Vault-Tec Vault 2 was raided by a Brotherhood of Steel chapter from Wyoming, who had been searching nomadically for a place to call home, after being forced from their old bunker in the midst of a war that swept all across the Native Lands. Escaping with few, without even his own departed family, Overseer Matthew Leopold Coleson led his people west from Montana to find a new home. In order to avoid the war (which at that time, had its front lines in Oregon), they decided on settling somewhere along the Canadian west coast. But instead of heading north and then west, however, they snuck through the northeastern borders of the waning, communistic People's Social Republic of Cascadia, and traversed the rural regions of Washington until reaching the Seattle area in the autumn of the year. Alas, the months that it had taken them to reach the area had allowed the front lines to move north, with the waning PSRC preparing to defend its capital city from invading New California forces. The group settled into a cave hidden in the wilds outside the urban area, and waited for the weeks-long battle to end as they tried to keep out from the sight of the combatants. It was in this cave that they were given time to form the groundwork for a community government, and where they began to show signs of legitimate organization as a new society. Matthew gathered his three main advisers; being Tyson Wisler, an out-of-work mercenary who joined the group and proved skillful in leadership and maintaining order, Alexis Cawthorne, the vault doctor, who became a trusted advisor during the recovery of the survivors, and Phil Geralds, an ex-revolutionary political strategist with a drive for progress. Together, they worked out a plan to go to Montana, as the political situation deemed it a more viable option. With the collapsing military structure of the PSRC and the confusion of the NCR, they found the way back east easier than coming west. And so with the coming of 2294 they settled in Columbia Falls - a remote town tucked away in the Rockies - and began to grow. Their first major expansion came from the secretive support of revolutionary groups in Kalispell and Whitefish, who were engaged in an unpopular rich-man’s war. When both governments were overthrown, the new ones joined the Union, and a new constitution was drafted. Elections were held in 2295, and Matthew took office as the first official President of the Union in January of the following year. In the summer of 2297, the city-state of Missoula approached the Union with a request for military backing in defense against Richard Frye, an ex-PSRC colonel from Cane who led a large division of troops. Missoula had been unable to get help from Gladel, and were in a small economic recession; they had been in very real danger for some time. Wisler, the military leader and Vice President at that time, went down with an army to work out a strategy against the Colonel. Unfortunately, the majority of Missoula's military and political leaders were wiped out along with some of the Union's high officers in a surprise attack. Wisler had been wounded and was sent home early, leaving his second-in-command, Phil, to lead the forces in Missoula. A first real wave of assaults came not a few days after, which were repelled decisively (and luckily), beginning a months-long war that would shape the Union's destiny. Phil began to reorganize the Union’s military structure, and called on emergency permissions from the President to have absolute control over the division he was residing over. With that grant, he ordered his communication officers to act as censors on all messages and reports sent to and from the Union army in Missoula. From there, very little is known about the war but what comes from word of mouth. It was known to be very brutal, and lack of hard details left ominous rumors that made many fear which ones were true, as countless atrocities were alleged of both sides. In the end, however, nobody but a few knew much except for the results. Around 92% of the Colonel’s men had been wiped out by the time they finally surrendered, and over half of those remaining would go on to be sent to labor camps. Phil - alongside his new primary subordinates, Jules Ricci and Richard Saul - returned to Columbia Falls and brought back an offer from the government of Missoula to join the Union. The legend of Missoula’s joining left a mark on the Union’s history, and the largest mass grave of Cascadian soldiers - in which the Colonel himself was buried - lies below the courtyard of the modern day capital building of New Columbia. Phil's Era and the Indian War Time carried on, and almost out of nowhere, the winter of 2301 brought about one of the most drastic changes in direction the Union had ever seen. With the disappearance of Matthew Coleson, and the subsequent shift in politics after Tyson Wisler was sworn in as President, a transformation from the Union being a collection of small cities to a full-fledged nation began. New policy began falling into place, people came into and fell out of power at a snap of the fingers, and an immigration boom that would last over two decades was followed by the recentralization of businesses from the war-torn south to the Union. The old guard mostly either went with the changes or went out; though many didn’t like the new direction, it was coming too fast and too strong to stop. Alexis Cawthorne’s 2303 disappearance was the final herald of the new era, and with that, power transferred to a new puppet master, whose invisibility faded until most everyone could make out a Phil Geralds. At the front of his de-facto rulership of the Union, Phil served an official position as Vice President for the rest of the term, and was expected to run with Tyson in the 2304 election, but decided to become a military officer full-on, and allowed William Jargon to run with Wisler in his place. Amongst the first decisions made in Wisler’s elected administration was to give Phil the title of Field Marshal, which gave way to further expansion by bringing order to lands untamed. Although he primarily ran the army from the Hardin Building – the military headquarters in Missoula – he would operate on the field when needed. However, he most preferred to be closer to home, as his domestic requirements were often more demanding. He tried to stay mostly out of the light to avoid acquiring a generalissimo-type reputation, but ruled silently from behind the curtain. In land mass, the Union of Federal Republics expanded slowly and greatly. It offered increasingly enticing diplomatic, cultural, economic, and militarial advantages, all while allowing its membering states a sense of independant pride. It brought an end to starvation in the war-drained Coeur d'Alene by 2306 by introducing new crops and livestock, as well as boosting its economy through trade. Ar the same time, they armed the rebels fighting the flimsy, post-Frye government in Cane, which was headed by the widely-hated former PSRC Minister of Propaganda, one of the few high command who survived the massacre in Seattle at the end of the war. After a short assisted revolution in 2307, the revolutionaries took over Cane, and joined the Union six months later. In 2309, at the city of Lethbridge to the north, the government there called on Columbia to help them fight a tiring war against the Cree indians, who had been closing in on the city for the better part of four years. The fighting that followed would come to be known as the 'running war', where the then-weak Cree forces fought in skirmishes as they retracted from the territory in response to the Union's fledgling, but full military force arriving Lethbridge joined, naturally, but only after a year of political idling - they had a pitiful excuse for a military, but a large city and healthy economy that gave politicians there an excess of pride. It would take years for these cities to fully integrate, but for the time being, the Union continued its steady expansion. Beginning around 2308, the city of Great Falls became subject for annexation by the Union, with the government at the time split between staying completely independant, or joining the Union to keep a good sense of national identity while keeping Gladel out. By 2311, Falls had enough support for a Columbia annexation to allow them to build a military base near the city, and a couple of months near to completion, a summit was scheduled to induct them in. Yet, only a few days before it was scheduled, a group of anti-Union extremists staged a coup and took over the government. The new power mandated that military forces in Falls leave the territory within two weeks - contravening the previous government's treaty allowing them three years of presence. The Union not recognizing these demands or this new government as legitimate, their military presence remained, and Richard Saul ordered a larger detachment of his army to mobilize and add on to the relatively small presence there. In the dead of night after the demand was rejected, however, the now-hostile Army of Falls overwhelmed the detachment there, and forced a retreat. Raul's army was intercepted three days later, and the Battle of Sun Prairie began the Falls War, which lasted a little under five days. The army of Falls eventually retreated across the river, and the Union men marched on. A camp was erected a few miles from the occupied camp, and the detachment called home for a larger force. Raul himself came down along with his entire army, and set up a temporary base further northwest of the camp. Falls dug in for defense and began building a trench network around the city, including in the south where Gladel had decided to mobilize. By then, unfortunately, both forces had closed in deeply, cutting off the city from all their food and crops. Although Raul had wanted to allow imports of food to come into the city, orders came down from Geralds that strictly disallowed it, and in fact, storehouses and grocers began going up in flames all over the city. The city held this way for nearly eight months, until the Union initiated an invasion in early 2312. Gladel followed, and both marched in to find very few willing to fight. Virtually nobody was lost on the invading sides. Thousands had already starved to death within the city, and the people were emaciated to the point where cannibalism was common everywhere. The government building was boarded up and cut off from both civilians and military. It was found that the extremists had locked every opposing politician in the basement and sealed the entrance to starve them to death; the rest committed mass suicide during the invasion. Great Falls International Airport was taken by the Union, Malmstrom Air Force Base was taken by Gladel, and the two governments agreed to share a puppet government in the city in order to reduce tension between the recovering civilians and the occupying nations. The city of Great Falls would not come close to fully recovering until the early years of the following decade. Around this time as well, the old mafia outfit which controlled the business in many areas of the NCR for the latter part of the century came to the Union, and began making waves. They sleuthed, forced, and talked their way into getting slice after slice of every pie they could find until by 2305, over a third of business operations out of New Colombia were controlled by the Moretti clan, and it would just grow from there. Legitimate corporations began to arise later in the decade, and stretched the economic reach of the Union until by 2315, it spanned as far as 450 to 600 miles around. The Indians… Modern Day By 2337... Society Government Structure Territory Military Wars Involving Columbia *Missoula *Indian War Relations Gladel Republic Columbia and the Gladel Republic have had historically strained relations becuase of seeing one another as threats. However, since the death of Phil Geralds in 2333, the two nations have seen a thaw in relations. New California Republic Cree Indians Technology and Science Currency Notes Category:Factions Category:TNL Factions